Click on the logo above
to visit the website for Cornell Cooperative Extension of Schuyler County

----------

Guest
Column: State Sen. Tom O'Mara

"Taking part, and pitching
in"

ALBANY, April 14-- Americans are known for volunteering.
In fact we’re coming off a week when the nation observed National
Volunteer Week in tribute to all of the many millions of citizens throughout
our communities, of every age and from all walks of life, who make such
a difference with their willingness to devote time, energy and sacrifice
to the lives and needs of others.

It’s a recognition, however, that shouldn’t – and
fortunately doesn’t – end after just one week.

The
nation’s 41st President, George H.W. Bush, recognized its importance.
He’s widely credited with having launched the modern volunteer service
movement. In 1990, he signed into law the first piece of federal service
legislation in two decades, the National and Community Service Act of
1990. He made public and community service a cornerstone of his presidency
when he said in his 1989 “thousand points of light” inaugural
address that one cornerstone of his presidency would be devoted to inspiring
“duty, sacrifice, commitment, and a patriotism that finds its expression
in taking part and pitching in.”

But we know that fewer and fewer Americans, for a variety of reasons,
are taking part and pitching in today. A recent report from the federal
Bureau of Labor Statistics, for example, revealed that volunteerism nationwide
is at a 10-year low. Make no mistake, there’s still a heck of a
lot of volunteering going on across the country – at least 63 million
Americans volunteered at least once between September 2012 and September
2013 – but the decline has become evident.

Here in New York State that’s particularly true in one sector
of volunteerism: emergency services. According to the Firemen’s
Association of the State of New York (FASNY), the number of volunteer
firefighters statewide has declined from 140,000 in the early 1990s to
fewer than 90,000 today. Volunteer emergency medical technicians (EMTs)
experienced a decline from more than 50,000 to 35,000 during the same
period, with some rural counties experiencing as much as a 50-percent
depletion of their EMT ranks.

It’s why I’m continuing to work with area Assemblymen Phil
Palmesano and Chris Friend on legislation we’ve sponsored for several
years aimed at helping localities recruit and retain volunteer firefighters
and other emergency services personnel. The legislation is known as the
“Omnibus Emergency Services Volunteer Incentive Act.” We view
it as a complement to the ongoing state-level efforts by FASNY and other
groups that keep drawing attention to what many believe is not only a
threat to the safety and security of our cities, towns and villages, but
also looms as the next property tax crisis in waiting for many rural,
upstate communities. FASNY, for example, has estimated that it would cost
local taxpayers more than $7 billion annually to replace volunteers with
paid fire and ambulance services.

So the reality is straightforward: the alarm has been sounded on the
challenge of recruiting and retaining volunteer firefighters and other
emergency services personnel. We have to keep seeking solutions. This
legislation helps us keep the challenge in front of the Legislature. Incentives,
while not the be-all and end-all solution, can be an effective piece of
a more broad-based response. The volunteer fire department has anchored
so many rural, upstate communities for so long that we can’t turn
our backs on the crisis.

Our legislation would:

-- provide a $400 state income tax credit for volunteer firefighters
and ambulance workers who have been active for four or more consecutive
years;

-- exempt motor vehicles owned and used in the performance of duty by
an emergency services volunteer from motor vehicle registration fees and
vehicle use taxes;

-- authorize local volunteer fire and ambulance companies to use state-administered
funds, collected annually through a two-percent fire insurance premium
tax on out-of-state insurers, to help offset the cost of health insurance
for their members; and

-- direct the state Higher Education Services Corporation (HESC) to
create a volunteer recruitment service college loan forgiveness program.

It also offers an opportunity to issue a reminder that in a few weeks,
at local volunteer fire departments regionally and statewide, one of the
year’s most important volunteer recruitment efforts takes place.
It’s an annual event sponsored by FASNY called “RecruitNY.”
Over the weekend of April 26-27 volunteer fire departments open their
doors to the public in an effort to “boost our ranks.”

You can find out more about RecruitNY, including a comprehensive list
of participating departments, at www.recruitny.org.